Once upon a time, there were prosperous villages in the beautiful continent of Africa.
Slowly but surely, Portuguese and European slave traders invaded this landmass and captured the brilliant indigenous people for indentured servitude.
After their arrival to new lands, they eventually had to cope with racism, brutality, genocide, and stereotypes.
This was until late greats like Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and R.N. Gooden came along and fought injustices until their dying days.
And, now since they shed their blood, sweat and tears, blacks can live happily ever after…yeah right.
The new generation of blacks is still asleep.
Somewhere along the lines, the message of bigotry and injustices toward minorities, especially blacks became weaker and weaker because of the implementation of civil rights laws.
This only gave way to “hidden” racism, but mind you, it is still present.
On the highest of seven hills in Tallahassee, there exists one of the oldest predominantly black high schools in north Florida, FAMU DRS.
Although this institution had a prosperous history, we, the student body, fail to realize the torch we now must carry that has been passed down by our predecessors.
As a school full of culture and heritage, black history should be celebrated year round and not just in an unorganized program dedicated to people that are only known by recited lines and not genuine appreciation and acknowledgement.
Like a champagne tower, to achieve thorough penetration of a mentality, it all begins at the top.
If each instructor could incorporate our history and development and how it pertains to each subject, it would assist us in applying our heritage to every component of our lives.
Motivating and educating an age band of a minority group, particularly blacks, should include a reference to their ancestral history and inherited brilliance.
Due to poor authoritative consistency, we tend to doubt our administrators, which results in a school wide conflict that is stereotypical in black schools.
Jocelyn Kimbrough and I staged a silent protest in the main office because of the lack of sufficient heating during the winter season last school term.
“Our cooling and heating systems are controlled under the same unit as the rest of the university,” Kimbrough said. “So why was the whole high school building 40 degress, the same temperature as it was outside?” “We were trying our best to participate in class with our coats, scarves, and gloves on. We went to the main office and it felt like they had their own personal fireplace. We refused to go back to class until the problem was taken care of. Our principal suspended us for insubordination.”
This was one of the many incidents we can recall that proved our hierarchy distrustful.
Without unity, progress as a community is not possible. The AIDS epidemic, welfare, poverty, and poor support for affirmative action are problems we are currently facing that can not be solved until we realize that we are all still kinship. How we respond to these situations ultimately decides our fate as a whole.
We African-Americans originated from one of the most idealized continents in the world. Life itself is believed to some into existence there. We are noted for inventions from the calendar to the traffic light. Our pride should be noticeable and exuberant.
Living in the land of the free, has not been anything close to peaches and cream. Through the infamous conditions of slavery to lynching to verbal degrading like the word “nigger,” we created a momentum of change in this country for our people.
Let us not continue to siesta but instead become the new generation of trailblazers to further our community and unity.
Tynishia Williams is a staff writer for The Fang.